Choose
by Alyssa2
Summary: [OLD] What if, at Bevelle, Isaaru had chosen to ignore the temple's order and just continue his pilgrimage? And what if he made it to Zanarkand before Yuna?


Choose  
  
-  
  
"Isaaru?"  
  
Between my pounding heart and the rushing noise in my ears, I almost don't hear Maroda calling my name. My hands are shaking and my knees are weak. Sweat pours down my face and I stifle the mad urge to shed my stifling robe. We have just barely escaped with our lives - *damn* these guardian beasts, we made it here, how much more do we honestly need to be tested before I enter the Chamber of the Fayth?!  
  
"'Saaru! You okay?"  
  
And little Pacce! Of course he sat this battle out, but... by Yevon, if Maroda and I had died fighting that beast, then Pacce would have been left all alone.   
  
Only one of us must die here. I will perish defeating Sin, but Maroda and Pacce will leave this place. I swear it.  
  
"Isaaru!!"  
  
I shake my head and turn to face my brothers, smiling softly.  
  
"Sorry. I was thinking."  
  
"After a big fight like that!" Maroda puts one hand over his face and shakes his head. "Isaaru, you worried us!"  
  
This is... the last time I can just stop and think. This is the last day of my life. I bow my head quietly.  
  
"Sorry."  
  
Maroda hesitates, then shakes his head firmly. "No - don't apologize."  
  
Lifting my head to face him, I smile sadly. "Maroda--"  
  
"Don't say it," he says, his voice tight. "Don't you dare say goodbye, Isaaru."  
  
"If I don't, then what's left to say?"  
  
"Don't say anything," he insists. "I don't want - to say goodbye."  
  
A bare inclination of my head. "Then don't. Just let me go now."  
  
Maroda opens his mouth as if to speak, then shuts it and just stares at the floor, curling his hands into fists. Pacce is the one to step forward, taking my sleeve in his little hands.  
  
"We'll go to Guadosalam an' see you when the Calm starts, 'Saaru," he says, trying to smile even though I can see tears in his eyes. Brave little kid, I think. Oh, Pacce. I wish I could experience the Calm with you and Maroda... but I'll be the one to bring it.  
  
"Thank you, Pacce," I say quietly.  
  
He lets go and backs away, scrubbing bravely at his eyes. Maroda lifts his gaze to meet mine, and I do my best to smile encouragingly at him before I turn slowly and make my way to the pedestal in the center of the floor.  
  
This is it. This is where I go to die. To free all of Spira from Sin. To bring ten precious years of Calm. For Pacce to grow up in, and Maroda to grow old in. For everyone who has lost something dear to Sin, for all those weeping faces who smiled as I passed by.   
  
And... for myself. To achieve greatness in death. Lord Isaaru's Calm.   
  
I am a summoner. I am the hope of Spira. I am Isaaru and I am going to defeat Sin, damn it.  
  
"I'll give your regards to Lord Braska," are the last words I speak before stepping onto the pedestal. It sinks, and I close my eyes, ready to perform my last duty as a summoner.  
  
-  
  
"What?!"  
  
It doesn't even take a summoner to realize that there is no longer a fayth here. It's a very convincing fayth statue, and may even have held power once, but there's nothing there. It's dead. Empty.  
  
"What is this? What did I come here for?!"  
  
Staring at the dead statue, I became aware of a blue light that was not there before, and look up. That wretched old man from earlier, shedding pyreflies left and right, is standing there.  
  
"That statue lost its power as a fayth long ago."   
  
"Well I can see that!" I snap.   
  
"It is Lord Zaon, the first fayth of the Final Summoning," he continues, as though I hadn't spoken. "What you see before you is all that remains of him. Lord Zaon is... his soul is gone."   
  
"Then what--"  
  
The damn ghost doesn't even let me finish. "But fear not. Lady Yunalesca will show you the path. The Final Aeon will be yours. The summoner and the Final Aeon will join powers. Go to her now. Inside, the lady awaits."  
  
He performs the prayer of Yevon, and vanishes. I can feel my left eyelid twitching as it tends to do when I'm agitated. I am feeling greatly cheated.  
  
But the old fool said the Final Aeon would be mine, and irritated as I am, I'm inclined to believe him. So I step forward, over Zaon's empty statue, and enter the blue portal, thinking that this had better be good.  
  
The hall beyond the portal is grand and spacious, and filled with pyreflies, but otherwise empty. This is really starting to annoy me.  
  
Just as I start to consider storming up those stairs hoping to catch Lady Yunalesca idle so I can at least feel slightly vindicated, she appears at the top of the staircase. Damn.  
  
"Welcome to Zanarkand." Her voice, at least, is marginally pleasant. "I congratulate you, summoner. You have completed your pilgrimage. I will now bestow you with that which you seek. The Final Summoning...will be yours."   
  
"With all due respect, my lady," I ask, trying desperately to remain civil, "how in the name of Yevon am I supposed to receive the Final Aeon? There is no fayth for it."  
  
"You will have brought the fayth with you," she says with an odd sort of smile as she descends the stairs. "I presume your guardians are waiting outside?"  
  
A sudden chill runs down my spine. "Pacce and Maroda? What do they have to do with this?"  
  
"Everything." She lifts her arms into the air. "This is the nature of the Final Summoning. You must choose who will become the fayth for the Final Aeon. There must be a bond, between chosen and summoner, for that is what the Final Summoning embodies: the bond between husband and wife, mother and child, or between friends."  
  
"Or between brothers?!"  
  
She smiles and the truth is chillingly clear. Realization carries a force like a hundred Sin attacks focused into a single thought, and I fall helplessly to my knees, silently denying it all, as Yunalesca continues speaking.  
  
The bond between chosen and summoner. Lord Zaon was the *first* fayth of the Final Summoning. Lady Yunalesca chose him for her fayth.  
  
By Yevon.  
  
I am aware of a roughness in my throat and what seems like a strange din in the hall; my fingers curl tightly in my red hair as I shake my head furiously, unable to believe, unable to accept.  
  
I began my pilgrimage with the understanding that I would be the only casualty, that only my life would be forfeit - and now I find that I must...   
  
"NO!"  
  
The word grates through my throat, and I realize I have already been screaming.  
  
Choose a guardian, summoner. Choose a lamb for your slaughter. Choose who will become your Aeon and die battling Sin.  
  
And Sin will always come back. Your blood, your brother's blood, will mean nothing.  
  
"My lady - this is not *fair*!"  
  
"Do you not wish to bring the Calm? Do you not wish hope for Spira?"  
  
Maroda would be strong. Maroda would be a fine Aeon. Maroda would be my first choice - but then to leave little Pacce alone, without anyone to take care of him?! I might as well throw him in a pit of fiends - he could not possibly survive the journey back!  
  
"But Sin will come back! How can I kill one of my brothers, knowing that-- Lady Yunalesca, is there *no* hope to defeat Sin permanently? None at all?!"  
  
She shakes her head. "Sin is eternal. Every aeon that defeats it becomes Sin in its place... And thus is Sin reborn."  
  
I could never leave Pacce alone, with Maroda and I dead - but if I chose him for my Aeon...! He would not be alone, but to snuff out such a young life so cruelly, and sentence him to become Sin?! How could I bear the shame? Even on the Farplane, I would never forgive myself!  
  
"This is MADNESS!!" I howl, slamming my hands on the dusty floor. "I cannot-! Pacce - Maroda - how can I choose?! How can I possibly choose?!"  
  
Leave Pacce alone to die, or doom him to become Sin. Let Maroda to wander aimlessly, or sentence him to become a monster. It is an impossible choice. I cannot...  
  
This is when it strikes me, and I become suddenly, deadly silent. A perverse serenity overtakes me as I realize, with chill clarity, that there will be no Lord Isaaru's Calm. I will have no statues in the temples. I will not be the one to bring peace to Spira. Behind closed eyes, I see my brothers' faces, and I know I cannot choose either of them.  
  
I have failed as a summoner.  
  
-  
  
They were there when I, defeated, ascended on the pedestal. They had been waiting for me to return, with the power of the Final Aeon, ready to defeat Sin. They would have stood beside me as I died.  
  
What I told them was almost the truth. I told them I had not been strong enough to receive the Final Aeon, that I wouldn't be able to fight Sin. That we had to go home.  
  
They seemed less disappointed than relieved.   
  
Sin was waiting for us outside, but to give due credit to the beast, it seemed to realize that I had no Aeon to battle it with, and slunk away into the sea.  
  
We're trudging back through the snows of Mt. Gagazet now. This is the journey of the disgraced summoner, the failure. My pilgrimage is over. I must be the only summoner to ever *return* from Zanarkand. It's not something to be proud of.  
  
Neither of my brothers are far from my side. Pacce clings to my robes, Maroda has his arm across my shoulders. A part of me feels horrible and unworthy, but another part is grateful.   
  
They will never know the truth. I will never tell them the real reason why I could not receive the Final Aeon. Let them believe what they will. They never need to know why.  
  
"Ieyui...."  
  
My head snaps up. For an insane moment I think it is the voices of fiends or fayth.  
  
"Nobomeno..."  
  
"It's the Ronso!" Pacce exclaims giddily. "They're singing!"  
  
"Renmiri..."  
  
Dear Yevon, not this. Not now. I can't possibly face the proud Ronso as a failed summoner.  
  
"Yojuyogo..."  
  
"C'mon, Isaaru," Maroda nudges me. "Let's go. Let's just go."  
  
"Hasatekanae kutamae..."  
  
The last echoes die away as I take reluctant steps forward, a defeated man going to face true warriors.  
  
-  
  
We passed Lady Yuna and her guardians on the way down. I was too filled with shame to speak. Maroda explained for me and Yuna seemed to nod in understanding, her face hardening slightly, as though my weakness bolstered her resolve. For that, at least, I was glad.  
  
Sir Auron met my eyes briefly as we passed - his eye narrowed slightly, and he nodded once as though in understanding. It was a strangely reassuring gesture.  
  
The chocobo we've borrowed is a fast one. We'll be out of the Calm Lands in no time. And then, we begin the long, long journey home.  
  
I ride in the middle - Maroda behind me, Pacce in my lap. With one brother's strong grip around my waist to ensure that neither of us fall, and another's tiny hands beside mine on the reins, I know that there was nothing else I could have done there in Zanarkand, no other decision I could possibly have made.  
  
Part of me says it was wrong to leave Zanarkand empty-handed, without fighting Sin, without even *attempting* to bring the Calm when I had the chance right there in my hands.  
  
Another part - a small, selfish part - says that it was right, to save my brothers.   
  
Lady Yuna... I wish you all the strength in the world. Make up for my failure. Defeat Sin and I will see to it that you - even declared a traitor as you are - get your statues in the temples, and that the whole world knows that they are celebrating Lady Yuna's Calm.   
  
And I am sorry, dear lady, to leave you to pick up the pieces of my disgrace. 


End file.
